1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to print job management system and method, and in particular, it relates to method for selecting and exchanging job groups between application programs in a print shop using portable storage devices.
2. Description of Related Art
In an environment where a large number of print jobs are processed with multiple printers, there has been a need to manage print jobs efficiently in an organized fashion. Examples of such an environment are professional print shops and print/copy departments at large organizations, where a variety of print requests, such as large-volume duplication and large document printing, needs to be processed and completed by utilizing multiple printers within a short turn-around time. These environments are collectively referred to as “print shops” in this application. Typically, each printing job specifies a source file that electrically contains a document to be printed, the size, color and the type of the paper on which the document should be printed, the printing resolution, duplex or single-side printing, and certain finishing conditions, such as book, staple, collate printing, etc., depending on a print job requester's needs.
In order to process a large volume of print jobs that each differ in terms of these job parameters, a print shop utilizes multiple commercial grade printers, including black & white and color printers. Each of these printers has limitations on available printer settings, such as the paper size, the paper type, resolution settings, etc. In addition, the print shop employs various finishing devices, such as collators, staplers, hole punchers, folding machines, binding machines, etc. A print shop management system (or print job management system) is typically implemented by software or firmware programs executed by a print shop management apparatus such as a control computer or server connected to the printers. The print shop management system submits each print job to one or more printers and finishing devices to produce the print job. The job submission may be done automatically by the print shop management system, semi-automatically with certain amount of operator intervention, or manually where decisions of how to submit the print jot to appropriate printers or finishing devices are made by an operator.
The print shop management system organizes and manages print jobs using database entries, typically referred to as “job tickets.” A job ticket specifies values of various print job parameters, and associates itself to the source file(s). In one particular example, a job ticket may include a job ticket number, ticket name as well as the values of the following groups of various other job parameters: job information settings, basic settings (number of copies, orientation of paper, collate, offset printing, original paper size, output paper size, paper type, paper source, etc.), layout settings, cover sheet, finishing settings, inter-sheet settings, tab-paper settings, image quality settings, and customer information. A job ticket is associated with a source file (i.e. the document to be printed), and they collectively constitute a print job within the print shop management system.
Job tickets may be exported by the print shop management program so that the print jobs may be manipulated by other devices. Conventionally, exporting job tickets from the print shop management program involves selecting one job at a time and exporting that job as a compressed file containing the source file (document to be printed) and an associated job ticket file. In a conventional print job export method, the operator selects an “Export” option in a user interface (UI) of the print shop management program. The operator then manually chooses a destination folder (directory) location for the job ticket and the source file and exports the job ticket and source file to that location.
If this exported file is targeted for use by another software application, the file must be accessible for that application. However, the print shop environments may be such that various software applications are not located on the same network, located in the same room or building, or setup for simple job import from a networked drive or folder. In such cases, operators may employ USB (Universal Serial Bus) storage devices, memory cards, CD/DVD, or other portable storage devices to transfer the exported files. In a conventional method, the user manually selects the appropriate location (e.g. directory/folder) on the storage drive, and exports each compressed job, one at a time, to the storage device using the export capabilities provided by conventional print shop management software. The user then manually transports the storage device to the location of the target application. When importing the jobs from the storage device to the target application, the user traverses through the filesystem of the storage device and chooses each file (one at a time) to import to the target application.